1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a vehicle drive control apparatus, in particular, relates to a vehicle drive control apparatus to automatically stop or start an engine thereof.
2. Description of the Related Art
In these days of the increasingly important environmental issue, suppressing greenhouse effect gas exhausted from vehicles has been strongly desired. Recently, development of technology to suppress idling operation by automatically stopping an engine during vehicle stopping has been widely performed.
Following are examples of such technologies. A control apparatus for a hybrid vehicle to automatically restart an engine when amount of battery charge falls below a specified value during engine stopping has been proposed (see Patent Document 1, for example). Further, a technology to store behavior-related information at a storage portion along with map information when certain vehicle behavior is detected at some point and to reflect on vehicle control for passing through the same point through the same route has been proposed (see Patent Document 2, for example). Further, a technology to prohibit automatic starting of an engine as occurrence of vehicle collision being determined when the vehicle detects an impact of a specified value or higher has been proposed (see Patent Document 3, for example). Further, a technology to prohibit automatic starting of an engine during parking operation has been proposed (see Patent Document 4, for example). Further, a technology to forcedly start an internal combustion engine when negative pressure is not sufficiently ensured necessary for generating minimum desired assistance force by a brake booster has been proposed (see Patent Document 5, for example). Furthermore, a technology to prohibit automatic stopping of an engine, even if automatic stop conditions of the engine are established, when locking of a drive wheel is detected due to operation of an antilock braking system (ABS) and the like has been proposed (see Patent Document 6, for example).    [Patent Document 1] Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2004-166389    [Patent Document 2] Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2002-219957    [Patent Document 3] Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2003-138955    [Patent Document 4] Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2008-510926    [Patent Document 5] Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2001-012272    [Patent Document 6] Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2001-032734